Europeans never had Neanderthal neighbors. Russian find suggests Neanderthals died out earlier.

Nature News ^ | 05/11/2011 | Ewen Callaway

[April Lexington]

Now don't be postin pictures of me wife on here, fella!

[April Lexington]

So... according to this article, Dick Morris is a Neanderthal! Who knew!

[count-your-change]

New Jersey?

[wastedyears]

The other is that the designer of the universe used evolution to create the current observed reality.

Is that a theory in evolution? Sounds 100% like intelligent design.

[denydenydeny]

Stalin's Ape Men.

[Meet the New Boss]

That kid was awesome snowboarding the halfpipe at the 2010 Winter Olympics.

[wendy1946]

There's no reasonable definition of evolution which allows anybody to think of it as a tool which God would use. I mean, why would God want to use broken tools??

The problem is with the basic laws of mathematics and probability, with which evolution is essentially incompatible. The (proportionally) biggest group of people not buying into evoloserism is mathematicians, and not Christians.

The best illustration of how stupid evolutionism really is involves trying to become some totally new animal with new organs, a new basic plan for existence, and new requirements for integration between both old and new organs.

Take flying birds for example; suppose you aren't one, and you want to become one. You'll need a baker's dozen highly specialized systems, including wings, flight feathers, a system for pivoting flight feathers so that they open on up strokes and close on down strokes, a specialized light bone structure, specialized flow-through lungs and a high efficiency heart, a specialized tail, specialized general balance parameters, a beak (since you won't have hands any more...) etc. etc. etc.

For starters, every one of these things would be antifunctional until the day on which the whole thing came together, so that the chances of evolving any of these things by any process resembling evolution (mutations plus selection) would amount to an infinitessimal, i.e. one divided by some gigantic number.

In probability theory, to compute the probability of two things happening at once, you multiply the probabilities together. That says that the likelihood of all these things ever happening at once (which is what you'd need), best case, is ten or twelve such infinitessimals multiplied together, i.e. a tenth or twelth-order infinitessimal. The whole history of the universe isn't long enough for that to happen once.

All of that was the best case. For the pieces of being a flying bird to evolve piecemeal would be much harder. In real life, natural selection could not plausibly select for hoped-for functionality, which is what would be required in order to evolve flight feathers on something which could not fly apriori. In real life, all you'd ever get would some sort of a random walk around some starting point, rather than the unidircetional march towards a future requirement which evolution requires.

And the real killer, i.e. the thing which simply kills evolutionism dead, is the following consideration: In real life, assuming you were to somehow miraculously evolve the first feature you'd need to become a flying bird, then by the time another 10,000 generations rolled around and you evolved the second such reature, the first, having been disfunctional/antifunctional all the while, would have DE-EVOLVED and either disappeared altogether or become vestigial.

Now, it would be miraculous if, given all the above, some new kind of complex creature with new organs and a new basic plan for life had ever evolved ONCE.

Evolutionism, however (the Theory of Evolution) requires that this has happened countless billions of times, i.e. an essentially infinite number of absolutely zero probability events.

And, if you were starting to think that nothing could possibly be any stupider than believing in evolution despite all of the above (i.e. that the basic stupidity of evolutionism starting from 1980 or thereabouts could not possibly be improved upon), think again. Because there is zero evidence in the fossil record to support any sort of a theory involving macroevolution, and because the original conceptions of evolution are flatly refuted by developments in population genetics since the 1950's, the latest incarnation of this theory, Steve Gould and Niles Eldredge's "Punctuated Equilibrium or punc-eek" attempts to claim that these wholesale violations of probabilistic laws all occurred so suddenly as to never leave evidence in the fossil record, and that they all occurred amongst tiny groups of animals living in "peripheral" areas. That says that some velocirapter who wanted to be a bird got together with fifty of his friends and said:

Guys, we need flight feathers, and wings, and specialized bones, hearts, lungs, and tails, and we need em NOW; not two years from now. Everybody ready, all together now:
OOOOOMMMMMMMMMMMMMmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.....

You could devise a new religion by taking the single stupidest doctrine from each of the existing religions, and it would not be as stupid as THAT.

But it gets even stupider.

Again, the original Darwinian vision of gradualistic evolution is flatly refuted by the fossil record (Darwinian evolution demanded that the vast bulk of ALL fossils be intermediates) and by the findings of population genetics, particularly the Haldane dilemma and the impossible time requirements for spreading genetic changes through any sizeable herd of animals.

Consider what Gould and other punk-eekers are saying. Punc-eek amounts to a claim that all meaningful evolutionary change takes place in peripheral areas, amongst tiny groups of animals which develop some genetic advantage, and then move out and overwhelm, outcompete, and replace the larger herds. They are claiming that this eliminates the need to spread genetic change through any sizeable herd of animals and, at the same time, is why we never find intermediate fossils (since there are never enough of these CHANGELINGS to leave fossil evidence).

Obvious problems with punctuated equilibria include, minimally:

1. It is a pure pseudoscience seeking to explain and actually be proved by a lack of evidence rather than by evidence (all the missing intermediate fossils). Similarly, Cotton Mather claimed that the fact that nobody had ever seen or heard a witch was proof they were there (if you could SEE them, they wouldn't BE witches...) This kind of logic is less inhibiting than the logic they used to teach in American schools.

2. PE amounts to a claim that inbreeding is the most major source of genetic advancement in the world. Apparently Steve Gould never saw Deliverance...

3. PE requires these tiny peripheral groups to conquer vastly larger groups of animals millions if not billions of times, which is like requiring Custer to win at the little Big Horn every day, for millions of years.

4. PE requires an eternal victory of animals specifically adapted to localized and parochial conditions over animals which are globally adapted, which never happens in real life.

5. For any number of reasons, you need a minimal population of any animal to be viable. This is before the tiny group even gets started in overwhelming the vast herds. A number of American species such as the heath hen became non-viable when their numbers were reduced to a few thousand; at that point, any stroke of bad luck at all, a hard winter, a skewed sex ratio in one generation, a disease of some sort, and it's all over. The heath hen was fine as long as it was spread out over the East coast of the U.S. The point at which it got penned into one of these "peripheral" areas which Gould and Eldredge see as the salvation for evolutionism, it was all over.

The sort of things noted in items 3 and 5 are generally referred to as the "gambler's problem", in this case, the problem facing the tiny group of "peripheral" animals being similar to that facing a gambler trying to beat the house in blackjack or roulette; the house could lose many hands of cards or rolls of the dice without flinching, and the globally-adapted species spread out over a continent could withstand just about anything short of a continental-scale catastrophe without going extinct, while two or three bad rolls of the dice will bankrupt the gambler, and any combination of two or three strokes of bad luck will wipe out the "peripheral" species. Gould's basic method of handling this problem is to ignore it.

And there's one other thing which should be obvious to anybody attempting to read through Gould and Eldridge's BS:

The don't even bother to try to provide a mechanism or technical explaination of any sort for this "punk-eek"

They are claiming that at certain times, amongst tiny groups of animals living in peripheral areas, a "speciation event(TM)" happens, and THEN the rest of it takes place. In other words, they are saying:

ASSUMING that Abracadabra-Shazaam(TM) happens, then the rest of the business proceeds as we have described in our scholarly discourse above!

Again, Gould and Eldridge require that the Abracadabra-Shazaam(TM) happen not just once, but countless billions of times, i.e. at least once for every kind of complex creature which has ever walked the Earth. They do not specify whether this amounts to the same Abracadabra-Shazaam each time, or a different kind of Abracadabra-Shazaam for each creature.

[ThanhPhero]

Increased nutrition and health are evolution every bit as much as genetic change. Evolution just means change.

[wendy1946]

Perhaps humans departing Africa encountered resident Neanderthals in the Middle East.

This is a joke, right?

More of a joke than you'd think at first glance.

What's the basic problem with the idea of monkeys, apes, or proto-humans trying to down from trees and starting to live on the African savannas on a permanent basis (the whole basic starting point of all ideas about human evolution)?

I mean, what's the most major difference between human infants and the young of all prey animals? That's right: the baby deer have the sense to keep quiet until they're old enough to run, full speed. What's gonna happen the first time a gang of 'proto-humans' starts walking around on the savannas and some human infant starts screaming his head off because something displeases him, with 500 and 1000 lb predators walking around all over the place? Can you say "Dinner Bell"??

[arthurus]

Punk-eeek would seem to be compatible mostly with creationism if Creation were, in fact, done by something like a research team or a product design department. One form of life is created and set in place and allowed to develop over time until that type is seen to be less than optimal for the terms of the experiment, so in a short period of time that system is eradicated or knocked back and a new design or set of designs is put into place, etc. DOS gets replaced by windows. Perhaps Earth is a bell jar?

[wendy1946]

There's a funny consideration involved in the change we do observe...

The original creation of the RNA/DNA system appears obviously to be the work of a single pair of hands (God's). Nonetheless when you get to some point in the near pre-history of this planet, the picture changes; the engineering and re-engineering of complex life forms appears to have become a cottage industry with more than one pair of hands involved. There is no reasonable way to picture a well-intentioned God creating biting flies, ticks, chiggers, or disease organisms or any of the myriad creatures of Pandora's box. Likewise there is no reasonable way to picture God needing to go through 100 species of horses or elephants to get to the one he wanted.

[arthurus]

Maybe it is a Junior Class in a cosmic Georgia Tech.

[mountainlion]

The article clearly states that ALL humans not residing in Africa are partially descended from Neanderthals.

That is the opinion of the writer. This has never been proved. Liberals can be a monkeys uncle if they want. The Bible clearly states we were created by God.

[wendy1946]

The article clearly states that ALL humans not residing in Africa are partially descended from Neanderthals.

That's the way anybody would read it and that is total garbage. There is terribly little genetic variation in the entire human race, less than within a typical group of 50 African monkeys of the same species. Neanderthal DNA on the other hand was halfway between ours and that of a chimpanzee. If whites were even partially descended from Neanderthals the genetic difference between whites and the other two races would be huge.

[allmendream]

Biological evolution involves the change in allele frequency (or mutation into a new allele) in a population.

I.e. a change in DNA within a population.

If a population moved from a location with scant food resources to one with abundant food resources - and as a result attained a larger average size - that would not be an example of evolution. Unless there was also a corresponding change in the DNA of the population that would take place over several generations (i.e. the abundant resources favor certain alleles that are advantageous only when nutrition is not limited).

Chinese children raised eating an American diet grow taller than thier parents or Chinese raised cohorts. They didn't “evolve” to be taller - they just got taller through better nutrition.

[allmendream]

Neanderthal DNA was much more similar to human DNA than to chimpanzee DNA not “halfway between”.

Human genes and Neanderthal genes are 99.5% identical.

Human genes and chimpanzee genes are 98% identical.

It is estimated that only 1-4% of the DNA of anyone with non-African ancestry is of Neanderthal origins. So of 100 ancestors at the time of gene mixing - some 99 to 96 of them would be human and only 1 to 4 of them Neanderthal.

Thus your idea that the difference between non-Africans (not just “whites” but all Asians, Islanders, Persians, Arabs, Europeans, etc) and African people would be much larger is pure bunk.

First there IS more difference in DNA between Africans and non-Africans than between any other group and the rest of humanity.

Secondly your assertion that Neanderthal DNA was halfway between ours and chimps is absolutely wrong.

Thirdly, mixing in 1 to 4% of something 99.5% identical is not going to add up to a “huge” genetic difference.

[wendy1946]

Neanderthal DNA was much more similar to human DNA than to chimpanzee DNA not “halfway between”.

A lie does not become truth via repetition.

".....He said his team ran four separate tests for authenticity - checking whether other amino acids had survived, making sure the DNA sequences they found did not exist in modern humans, making sure the DNA could be replicated in their own lab and then getting other labs to duplicate their results. Comparisons with the DNA of modern humans and of apes showed the Neanderthal was

about halfway between a modern human and a chimpanzee."

[allmendream]

Well a difference of 2% between Humans and Chimps and 0.5% between Humans and Neanders is more accurately characterized as being 3/4 between human and chimpanzee tending towards human - but if you prefer a journalists characterization to actual knowledge and a more accurate assessment - have at it.

The same guy who did the work that your cite (Dr. Paabo) characterized as “halfway” is also the guy who says that 1-4% of the human genome (of non-Africans) is from Neanders. And he characterized Neanders - not as halfway chimp - but as mostly human - as you can read below.

The % difference in genetic and genomic DNAis perfectly compatible with Humans and Neanders having a MRCA (most recent common ancestor) about HALF a million years ago and Humans and Chimps having a MRCA some six million years ago.

“Svante Paabo, the pioneer of palaeogenetics, equivocated when a reporter asked whether his genome study suggested Neanderthals are the same species as us: “I would more see them as a form of humans that were a bit more different than people are from each other today, but not that much.”
Why so shy? Putting aside the vexing question of what defines a species - which flummoxed even Linnaeus and Darwin - it is hard to see why Neanderthals should now be considered as anything other than Homo sapiens. We know that Neanderthals bred with our ancestors and produced fertile offspring, which is one hallmark of a species. And there is plenty more evidence to support giving them the status of Homo sapiens neanderthalis. Neanderthals shared a common ancestor with modern humans around 500,000 years ago. Its descendants went their separate ways as the Neanderthals adapted to colder climes, but then, at least 50,000 years ago, they resumed relations in the eastern Mediterranean, where the two populations met again. This pattern wouldn't necessarily merit separate species status for most animals, so why for us and Neanderthals?”

But even if your numbers were accurate and Neanders were more like 99% identical in genetic DNA rather than 99.5% - (compared to 98% for Chimps - thus “halfway between”) - mixing in 1 to 4% of something 99% the same is still NOT going to add up to a “huge” genetic difference.

[wastedyears]

I also remember asking the guy that if we don’t need tail bones, why haven’t we ‘evolved’ and gotten rid of them.

Never got an answer to that either.

Also, if intelligence was something that ‘evolved’ as well, we wouldn’t have Liberals anymore.

[wastedyears]

Sounds like you’re describing intelligent design. A Creator making one form of life, then after a while making another form of life that is more advanced.

I think computers would be a good example. Every new product cycle has something faster and more powerful than the previous cycle.